


What It Says on the Tin

by neifile7



Category: Torchwood
Genre: 5 Times, Jack's absence, Jack's return, M/M, Stopwatch kink, Team Reunion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-09
Updated: 2013-10-09
Packaged: 2017-12-28 21:48:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/997161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neifile7/pseuds/neifile7
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five moments where Ianto Jones, Torchwood archivist, reflects on labels.  Takes place between s1e12 and s2e9, with references to DW s1 and s2.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What It Says on the Tin

**Author's Note:**

> In memory of chiara7, an extraordinary archivist and friend. First published on LJ on 1/29/09.

I. You people and your labels

Since Jack bulldozed into his life and rearranged all its boundaries – oh, three or four times now, at last count --  Ianto’s given a lot of thought to _what_ he is.  Not just to Jack, although that’s a minefield all on its own, but how he would slot himself into the messy archive that is Torchwood.   It’s his job, after all, putting tags and descriptions on odd bits of space junk, and he sometimes thinks he’s the most random bit of flotsam in the lot.

 

When Jack was around, it was easy to put certain matters on hold for later filing.  Jack always absorbed every spare impulse for description and, especially, cross-referencing.

 

With Jack gone, Ianto realizes he can’t think of _himself_ as permanently Misfiled Under Harkness.  He’s resolutely tossed out the pamphlets that someone keeps leaving at the coffee station, full of references to “co-dependency” and “denial,” because however pertinent they may be, they won’t get the Hub clean or coordinate the next Weevil hunt or fill in the gaps in any other useful way.  There’s a certain irony in that, he supposes.

 

The biggest irony, of course, is that Jack’s bolt into the blue (box) has proven the most  painful and effective team-building exercise in their collective annals -- and apparently, it’s the biggest favor Jack’s ever done him.  Professionally speaking.

 

He’s not the tea-boy any more, he’s sure, even if Owen still calls him that on particularly bad days (he’s learned to steer clear of the autopsy bay when certain species arrive for dissection).  His coffee has become a gratefully absorbed ritual, easing them all into normalcy when they return from some muddy, adrenaline-soaked sortie.   The rest of the time, he’s one of them.

 

What he is to himself these days is a lot harder to peg. Until now, for starters, he’s never bothered to give his own sex life a professional once-over.

 

He’s never thought of himself as gay, and not just because Jack would snicker; he honestly doesn’t remember fancying men before.  Sure, he’d wanted Jack, wanted him hungrily once he’d had a taste, eventually wanted him so much that it was stupid to think of it as happy games or comfort or even a hangover from his Lisa-obsessed need.  But until Jack left him in this miserable erotic limbo, Ianto had never considered shagging another bloke.

 

He hasn’t put it to the test, really.  Just noticed, on their rare pub nights, that not all – or even _most_ —of the appraisals come from women.  That he sometimes makes eye contact, does a little idle checking-out of his own.   Occasionally a more direct come-on or phone number materializes with the next round, but he’s politely brushed it off each time. 

 

He suspects that Owen, who seems to have developed a belated and unhealthy interest in his sex life, has encouraged one or two of these approaches. As if his response would be a bizarre Jack-equivalent of the Rift prediction software:  Ianto gets laid, especially by some bloke = Jack is gone for good.  QED. Let’s all move on.  Or not.

 

Owen, of course, thinks that Ianto’s obsessed --  a neat bit of projection, really, because Jack’s gravity field has always disturbed Owen’s orbit far more visibly than his own.  Owen asks him point-blank, once, if he’s gotten over his infatuation, which is making it entirely too easy: “Absolutely.  Yours, I see, remains intact,” a riposte good for one twenty-minute diatribe on the subject of Jack Harkness, wanker.  Ianto takes a certain vicious relief in knowing that if he’s too tired to curse Jack privately, he can always rely on Owen to do it for him.

 

In his bleaker moments, Ianto knows he’s well past infatuation.  He doesn’t recognize his knotted state as familiar in any way, nothing, _nothing_ like what he felt for Lisa.  He’s not in love, not _pining_ , for fuck’s sake, but he doesn’t think about anyone else when he touches himself, and he can’t picture bringing home a one-off shag of either gender.  He only sees his flat first thing in the morning, anyway.  He’s far too busy occupying Jack’s empty bed the rest of the night hours.

 

II. Part-time shag

Owen, he knows, has little regard for him at the best of times, and bulletproof contempt for his dealings with Jack.  Or so Ianto believes before Jack’s very demonstrative kiss and vanishing act.  He’s grateful that Tosh and Gwen seem content to file that moment under Matters We Will Tactfully Not Mention (although something in Gwen’s appraising eye suggests that the subject is deferred rather than closed), but it’s to be expected that Owen will go for the jugular.   He’s got to deflect attention from his own breakdown, after all.

 

At least Owen picks his moment in the Tourist Centre, where Ianto spends less time these days, but where he always has tasks to occupy his hands and eyes, and a foolproof method (developed on Jack’s account, of course) of shorting out the CCTV on a moment’s notice.

 

“You know, there are days when I ask myself what you’re still doing here,” Owen begins, leaning against the counter and stealing a sip of Ianto’s coffee.

 

“Last I checked, it was still my job.  Fetch your own mug if you want some,” Ianto says, sorting archival bags by size.  “Yes, well, there’s the small matter of my flat and dry-cleaning bills, not to mention the rates.  And you lot really can’t be left on your own for long.”

 

“And there’s the retcon.”

 

“There’s that.”

 

“Though frankly, mate, in your shoes I’d give it serious thought.  I mean, when I look at all the ways Jack bloody Harkness screwed you over.  Not exactly the sort of memories you want to live with, yeah?  The number of times he’s had your arse and then taken your balls with it.”

 

Reverse psychology with a vengeance, Ianto thinks.   He doesn’t believe for a moment that Owen actually wants him to leave, but he clearly wants to get a rise out of him, maybe have a thorough pissing contest and a good punch-up for afters.

 

Ianto’s been there and done that.  Owen’s got nothing but the hole in his shoulder.  Doesn’t stop him, though.

 

“He takes down your cybergirlfriend, hooks up with the bloke he stole his name from, and then fucks off to god knows where.  Don’t tell me you’re waiting for him after all that.”

 

“Fine, I won’t tell you.  Do let me know the moment you see me whinging and plucking daisy petals.  I’m sure I won’t have a clue otherwise.”

 

They both grin a bit, because really, this is not a bad description of how Gwen’s been behaving when not fully occupied.

 

Then Owen looks down and rubs a finger through an old cigarette burn on the counter.  “D’you think he’s coming back?”

 

This, of course, is what Owen really wants to know, what he will go on asking at intervals for the next month, and Ianto really wishes he could look him in the eye, hates himself just a little for ducking down and hauling up a fresh batch of labels from under the counter.  “Don’t see why he should.”

\------------

It had taken them a little under twenty-four hours to piece it together, from the moment they located the CCTV footage of Jack pelting across the Plass.  It might have taken less if Tosh hadn’t wasted hours trying to hack his personal file (the paper one, as Ianto already knew, being long purged).  She has better luck with the files containing Jack’s private researches.

 

Item: a series of incidents going back to 1879 from the Torchwood One archive, describing the alien known as the Doctor and his peculiar mode of travel. One of these reports involves a spaceship crashing into Big Ben, an aborted coup d’état, and a space pig.  Corroborating testimony from Harriet Jones MP and T. Sako, consultant.

 

Item: reports detailing the Doctor’s service with UNIT in the 1970s.  No photographs, but a description at variance with what Tosh remembers of the Doctor’s appearance.

 

Item: a few surviving fragments of CCTV footage from Torchwood One on the day of the Canary Wharf Battle, showing the blue telephone box in a holding area.  The man who steps out of it, to immediate armed detention, bears no resemblance either to the UNIT description or to Tosh’s recollection.

 

Item: a highly classified account by Harriet Jones, Prime Minister, of her experiences aboard the Sycorax ship and the subsequent use of deadly force, developed by Torchwood One, to destroy same.  The account also describes how the Doctor, apparently fresh from a “regeneration,” lost his hand in a swordfight and promptly regrew it.

 

This file bears the digistamp of the Torchwood One archive.  An addendum describes the identification and retrieval of the severed hand, with a final note, dating from early 2007, that the artifact in question has been transferred to Cardiff, as per request of CJHarkness, Branch Director.  Rationale given: proximity to Rift energy will assist analysis of the artifact’s metatemporal properties.

 

Item: CCTV footage, at variance with that in the Hub’s official record, showing the Plass in September 2006.  Tosh and Owen do a quick check to confirm that the Hub went into twenty-four hour lockdown that day.  The footage plainly shows the same blue telephone box as before, parked almost directly on top of the invisible lift.  Four persons appear at different times, entering or exiting the box.  Two, a young man and woman, are unknown. One is Tosh’s Doctor. And when they spot the fourth, wearing unfamiliar clothes and an unexpected air of youth, no one says a word.

 

Ianto would have desperately preferred not to discuss any of this, but Gwen will not leave it alone.  Especially since she can report, with suitable drama, that Jack had been waiting for “the right kind of doctor.”  Had even admitted, moments before he vanished, that this alone could have tempted him to open the Rift.

 

“So he’ll see this Doctor, get himself fixed if he can, and then he’ll be back,” she concludes, brightly.  Or not so brightly, given that there are several flaws in that logic.

 

Before he can stop himself, Ianto says, “Don’t think it’s as simple as that.”

 

Three faces swing toward him, and he regrets saying anything, because it’s clear that they think he has some privileged information, _like Jack ever tells his office totty anything,_ and it’s just a little extra kick of public humiliation.   Because he’s quite sure, now, that he never knew Jack at all in any way that mattered.

 

“Look, we’ve all heard Jack go on about other planets and species and even other times in history. He knows _something_ about the future, or he wouldn’t be giving us all the line about readiness in our century.  This Doctor’s a time-traveler, as good as immortal himself, and for all we know he’s the _reason_ Jack has that knowledge.  They traveled together before, and Jack’s been waiting for him, that’s obvious.  How do we know,” and he gropes for a genuine worry that won’t give away his deeper fears, “that Jack won’t ask to go back to where or when he comes from?”

 

“What, and just leave us here?”  Gwen demands, truly outraged. Ianto wishes for a moment that he had half her confidence, then cancels the wish.

 

“Well,” Tosh chips in, unexpectedly,  “He trusts us, presumably, or he’d have left more detailed instructions.  Or maybe there was some emergency, something too urgent to even tell us about. Maybe the Doctor asked for his help.  He seems to make a regular habit of rescuing planets.”

 

It’s a semi-comforting thought, but Ianto isn’t anxious to waste their waning energy speculating on it.  He’d like to cut this off before something unbearable is said.  “Yes, and sometimes he half-destroys them in the process.  I should know.”

 

And since Canary Wharf and Lisa have always been the best conversation killers in his arsenal, rarely deployed but always effective, the team leaves it at that for the time being.

 

No one comments on the disappearance of the stasis jar.  Ianto’s relieved.  He doesn’t want to recall, let alone discuss, the time that Jack let a lethal alien escape rather than risk losing the severed hand.  He doesn’t want to admit that he’s never seen Jack look more afraid, more wrecked – not after Estelle, nor Suzie, nor John’s suicide, not even after the real Captain Jack.  And never, of course, in relation to himself.

 

\------------- 

“What’s he like?”  Gwen asks drowsily one night, when they’ve raided Jack’s liquor cabinet after a particularly exhausting Weevil chase.  “Jack,” she adds unnecessarily.  “You know.  In bed.”

 

Ianto’s had just enough to drink to reach for a suitably expansive, Harkness-style reply.  “Nobody you’d want to introduce to your sister, if you had one.”  He takes another swallow and grins lewdly.  “He likes to shock.  You know.”

 

Gwen smiles, a little nostalgically.  “Right.  Always showing off, our Jack.  And I bet he’s selfish.  Really, really selfish even if he gives good value.”

 

“Giving good…value is one way of putting it,” and Gwen giggles at that.   He won’t touch the rest of her assumption with a bargepole.  When it comes to Jack, he’s never been able to tell the difference between extreme selfishness and utter generosity.  He’d never wanted to.

 

III. Eye candy

After the Hub, the hotel suite seems posh and sterile and doesn’t strike Ianto as a particularly suitable place to celebrate Jack’s return.  Which, he supposes, is what they’re doing, with bits and bobs of room service and two bottles of the best whiskey that the hotel has on offer.  Even Jack is drinking for once, and why not; they’re truly off the clock.

 

The alcohol probably keeps the others from noticing, or at least pursuing, Jack’s _grotesque_ evasions on the subject of where he’s been and who John and Gray are, really, and why the fuck they’ve just risked their lives and Cardiff to get his sociopathic ex out of town. 

 

No, Jack gets Gwen started on her wedding plans and segues smoothly into outré suggestions for the honeymoon (“Best live shows are in Paris, but you can’t beat Amsterdam for the sex toys, at least ones designed for humans – which reminds me, Tosh, did you ever figure out that Trufaxian artifact, the one I thought had to be a six-orifice vibrator?”).

 

It’s ludicrous and fun and so _Jack_ , the outrageous premise and circumstantial detail that leave you guessing just how much he’s winding you up.  He has to smile, a little, and Jack catches his eye, sends him that half-shy, half-fervent look that unsettled him so much in the office, earlier.

 

Then Jack’s on his feet and back to his authoritative self.  “Right, kids, they’re keeping the spa open for you, so I suggest you go take advantage of the one time Torchwood’s gonna pamper you like there’s no tomorrow, because hey, there _is_ no tomorrow.   You too, Ianto, put away that PDA and get a hand massage before your thumbs seize up or something.”

 

Gwen leans over to touch his sleeve.  “What about you, Jack?  You could probably use the relaxing as much as the rest of us.”

 

“Maybe later.  Gotta make a few calls, let the big boys know I’m back in the saddle.  Catch up on a few war movies while I’ve got that big plasma screen.”

 

“Catch up on porn, you mean,” Owen says.

 

“Part of a well-balanced viewing diet, as you know very well, Dr. Harper.”

 

Gwen and Tosh lean in to hug him, and Jack gives them all a fond, embracing smile before he slides his hands in his pockets, turns and strolls in the direction of his room.

 

Watching his retreat (and savoring the view, despite himself), Ianto’s fairly sure that neither UNIT calls nor porn are particularly high on Jack’s to-do list.  On the other hand, he can’t guess if or where _he_ fits, either, and that’s just an exasperatingly familiar sensation.

 

A Jack who wants to date him, who seems to think that courtship is suddenly a good idea, baffles him as much as the one who kissed and ran.  A Jack who voluntarily left the ex from heaven and kicked out the ex from hell should not be so nervous, so bloody _coy_ around his ex office shag.

 

Ianto snags the whiskey bottle en route to his own room.

 

It’s only when he gets there, eases out of his own jacket and hangs it up, that it hits him: Jack’s put him in a position to demand as well as grant favors.  Jack might even be hoping he’ll take some initiative – and the thought of that unstoppers several choice memories and fantasies he’s been bottling up.   And he realizes that he’s got a rather particular and urgent agenda of his own, right now.

 

With Jack back within range – smelling range, tasting range – every residual ache sharpens into something intolerable. He’s horny as hell, and it’s been far too long since he got laid.

 

He’d really like a chance to grudge-fuck John’s insults right out of his system.  And he wants to mark his territory, once and for all, against any other troublemaking time-travelers from the Harkness back catalogue.

 

He checks to make sure the stopwatch is still in his pocket, then returns to the suite and knocks firmly on the door. 

 

When it opens, Jack just looks at him blankly for a long moment, as though he doesn’t quite remember who he is. 

 

So he’ll have spell it out a bit, not a problem.  “Thought there was a hand massage on offer? Sir?”   That seems to focus Jack’s attention, but he still looks unsure, looks _lost_ in some way Ianto can’t place.  “Since we’re doing the gentlemanly thing, I’d point out that I’ve already bought you a drink, but perhaps you’d like some room service as well?”

 

And at that, Jack finally breaks into a full-toothed, familiar and thoroughly dirty smile.  “Ianto.  _Do_ come inside.”

 

And he does (eleven minutes and forty-two seconds later).  And again (thirty-seven minutes and one spectacular hand massage later).

 

The third time, Jack murmurs, “Forgiven me yet?”  And he answers, a little breathlessly, “Work in progress, sir.  I’ll be sure to give you, ah, regular updates,” and Jack huffs gently against his belly before returning enthusiastically to the matter in hand.

 

The third time, there’s no biting, no bruising, and no furtive weeping on either side.

 

But that’s probably not something they’ll discuss, then or later.

IV. We dabble

Jack’s never mentioned Martha by name, except for a brief head’s-up on her imminent visit that makes it very, very clear she should be shown every courtesy and then some.  Ianto has no time for more than a little hasty research, and knows better than to ask Tosh to hack the UNIT database.

 

But there’s _something_ familiar about the self-possessed young woman who strides into the Tourist Centre, lovely with her huge eyes and sensual mouth.   He’s not sure why he thinks of Lisa – there’s no real resemblance, only a spark of association with London and Torchwood One that he can’t place.

 

Downstairs, he watches Jack carefully, sees him greet her with an intimacy that seems intense and recent but probably isn’t sexual, if he’s any judge.  A stray memory suddenly slots into place -- a much-viewed, blurry scrap of footage from the _Valiant_ , the sole clue to Jack’s whereabouts and companions in his absence.  So.  Martha has something to do with the Doctor.   But – and this matters badly to his comfort -- she’s come from UNIT as a colleague, not, apparently, as an emissary from the magical blue box.

 

Still, he’s never seen Jack show this kind of deference to anyone, certainly not to other UNIT personnel.  And Martha doesn’t hesitate to take charge, in the teeth of the team’s wariness.  For once, it seems, Ianto’s not the most jealous one in the room.

 

She has Owen at a disadvantage within seconds (which means that he’ll spend the rest of her visit trying to get in her pants, which will put Tosh off her stroke as well).  Gwen, meanwhile, tags along on Martha’s grand tour of the Hub, obviously intent on defending her turf through girl-talk and sly Jack-stabbing. 

 

Later, he makes sure that his own briefing is respectful but thorough – who knows what sort of field experience UNIT medical officers get – but while she listens politely, it’s also subtly clear that he can’t teach her a thing.  The Doctor again.

 

The last thing he expects is her sly allusion to red caps and roleplay.  Ah, Jack’s been indiscreet, then (and Ianto quickly adds five appropriate punishments to his to-do list).

 

Martha surely knows the Harkness MO as well as any gorgeous woman would: he’d wager that Jack had hit on her within moments of their meeting, in fact.  But that’s not half as disturbing as the notion that she’s seen Jack _with the_ _Doctor_.

 

It would be bloody stupid to claim any more intimate knowledge than that.  Next to the mysteries of the blue box, anything that he and Jack get up to would seem like…dabbling.

 

He wonders what it means when Jack insists he stay with Martha in the hospital.   Maybe it’s a way of protecting them both, or maybe (he hopes) it’s that he trusts her with Ianto more than the others.  Martha ailing, possibly dying, could reveal things that have stayed sealed up in Jack’s most secure archives until now.

 

He holds her impossibly wrinkled hand gently while she runs through the messages she wants passed along to Tom, to her family. Just in case, she says.  She’s stoic and dignified in all the ways he admires most, and he aches to think that the bloody Harkness Law of Unintended Consequences has landed all of them here.  Again.

 

“Jack said that you were at Canary Wharf,” she says suddenly, her voice still quavery, and he nods, taken aback by the implications of that disclosure.  “I guess you know all about surviving the worst, then.  I lost a cousin there.  Adeola.  She worked for the director,” and Ianto suddenly realizes why Martha has seemed vaguely, personally familiar to him, in a way unconnected to Jack or Cardiff.

 

“The point is, you know about the Doctor, don’t you?  Who he is.  Sort of.  I mean, none of us really know, although Jack and I….well, we’ve had more clues than most, I’d say, not that it’s made us any wiser.  He…changes people.  Jack most of all, I think, but nobody gets away without some damage.  Maybe it makes us better in the long run, I don’t know yet.  Guess I’ll never figure it out now.”

 

It’s the final splinter in his heart: not just Martha’s admission, but confirmation of the one feeling that he and Jack can never, ever admit to having in common.

 

“Here’s the thing.  The only way you can walk away from the Doctor is if you’ve got something real, something that’s _yours_.  I’ve got that now, thank god, but Jack.  I think all Jack’s got is you lot, and I know what you said, Ianto, but I have eyes, you know.  He trusts you, he _needs_ you.  Don’t mess him around if you can help it.”

 

“Jack has his own talent for making messes, in case you haven’t noticed,” he says dryly.  “But someone’s got to stick around to kick his arse over this one.  Don’t think Owen’s going to be up to the job, do you?” and they laugh, a little hollowly, but it eases something behind Martha’s too-young too-old eyes.

V. It’s not like that

“Ever think about being a soldier?”  Jack asks one night.

 

“Mmm, this about your uniform fetish again?”

 

“Nah, just curious.”

 

They’re stretched comfortably on Ianto’s bed, something that makes him more content than he’ll ever admit.  Sometimes Jack’s cot, comforting and handy as it is, seems far too small to hold the weight of their bodies and all the loaded memories.  Here they have a breathing room that’s more than physical.  He’s unspeakably glad, now, that no one but Jack has ever shared this space with him.

 

(And it must be said that there are advantages to having another permanent insomniac on staff, especially one as prone to boredom as Owen.  Jack gets more evenings off from the Rift, and tends to make the most of them.  And he seldom returns to the Hub without finding a new set of porn links in his inbox.)

 

“Not as such, no,” Ianto says at length.  “There were times when my tad would have gladly packed me off, I think. Thought my arse needed kicking, or that I was getting too poncy for my own good.”

 

Jack snorts.  “Goes to show what he knew about the military, then.”  He traces an idle pattern of circles on Ianto’s hip.  “Back in the day, you’d have had officers dueling each other to have you as batman.  Or quartermaster.  Or even as lieutenant.  You’d fit perfectly in a dozen roles and ranks.”

 

“So who needs the military while I’ve got Torchwood?  Even if Owen did accuse me of screwing my way into promotion the other day.”

 

He hadn’t meant to allude to that moment at the coffee machine, because it makes him sound so petty, and really, it didn’t matter that much next to Owen’s pain.  But Jack immediately fixes him with what he thinks of as the one-yard stare, the one that holds them in an intimate space with no room for evasions.  “Does it bother you?” he asks softly.

 

“Not really.  I didn’t like it, of course.  It’s demeaning to think of us that way, even if I can understand why Owen said it.”  He pauses.  “Oddly enough, I think I may be picking up your dislike for twenty-first century labels.”

 

Jack rolls on his back and contemplates the ceiling for a long moment, his hand drifting down Ianto’s thigh.  “It’s funny,” he says finally.  “I’ve been a soldier, one way or another, for most of my life.  And even when I wasn’t, when I tried to operate on my own, I kept winding up in small teams.  Places where you routinely had to trust your life to the people alongside you.   I can remember what that was like, back when I still had a life to lose.  But even afterwards, it seemed like I was seeking that out.  Or it sought me out.”

 

“Sounds familiar enough,” Ianto replies, wondering where this is going, but unwilling to break the rare flow of reminiscence. 

 

“See, the thing is…where I come from, a situation like that, people always wound up sleeping with each other, and it wasn’t any big deal, not in the way it is here and now.  It wasn’t about taking advantage or getting a leg up in the pecking order. And it was something you’d figure out pretty quickly, not a lot of bullshitting around.  I dunno, maybe there’s an evolutionary reason for it.  Like, certain dangers override whatever jealousy or power instincts we have, and what’s left is that need to connect.”  He pauses, visibly weighing his next words.  “All I know is how it felt.  That if you could trust someone to take care of you in bed, you’d trust ‘em to watch your back in the field.  And you were always better, stronger for having one real comrade in arms beside you.” 

 

“Comrade in arms,” Ianto repeats, and smiles.  It’s a little hackneyed, maybe.  It confirms everything he’s always suspected about Jack’s sentimental streak.  But for the man whose job is cataloguing Torchwood’s infinite variety, it strikes a note of deep, _professional_ satisfaction. 

 

It’s a label he can live with.


End file.
